Sunday, January 14, 2001 12:40 p.m. PST
here's what's been up: went to frys yesterday because robert needed some minidiscs and a pair of headphones on our way to in & out. and the neatest thing caught my eye in the digital media aisle! 8 cm, 21-min miniature cd-rs. they were just these cute little burnable cds i thought would be so cool for ep-sized recordings, so i picked up a 5-pack. the discs were labeled 12x, but since they only cost $6, i figured if they weren't backwards-compatible with my 8x burner it'd be no huge loss. upon inserting them into my system i discover that nti cd-maker pro can't detect the media. so now i have these five cute little 8cm cds in my room, and i can't do shit widdem. moral of the story? get the full story on compatibility first OR, just make sure you're comfortable wasting your money.

other than that, i watched ryan phillipe and benicio del toro in the muddled, problematic caper film way of the gun. i will say this: the plot was anything but predictable, although i can't say the same for the infinite-clip shootout scenes. del toro's voiceovers were totally unnecessary, and all of the characters suffered from underdevelopment. plus the flick was waay too long. ohwell. i also managed to write the musical foundations of three songs yesterday. now all i need is lyrical subject matter. any ideas, anyone? anyone?

on the docket for today: purchase of schoolbooks, pizza, watching of behind the music, the simpsons and the critic. and maybe some work.

Friday, January 12, 2001 09:40 a.m. PST
4-day weekend dead ahead. i was lucky enough to arrange my class schedule so that i have fridays off, but that could change next week. amc is showing curse of frankenstein and the day the world ended back to back this evening, so i'll definitely be watching those british b-flicks. other than that, the weekend is kind of up in the air: i have to goto frys and out to eat, but other than that, i'll prolly just end up sitting around here, possibly digitizing the occasional guitar riff and maybe doing some schoolwork.

and extremely perturbed also, because of the dearth of decent bands playing in the bay area this month. bottom of the hill is hosting mainly bands unknown to me (no mean feat, i wanna tell ya) in january, which i wouldn't mind attending except that they're all 21+. bastards. the only way 21+ shows could be more profitable than allages is if the show is a guaranteed sellout. that way, a higher percentage of those that get in will buy drinks from the bar. but that's a futile gripe; because there just aren't that many bands coming to town i really want to see. i mean, mudhoney, the black heart procession and imperial teen are coming, but i really could give a fuck about those guys. the only allages show this month at bottom of the hill is guttermouth, which i would've attended in highschool but now i'm too much of a frumpy indiesnoot to even consider such a laughable notion. i think unwound and superchunk are coming to town next month, so maybe all's not lost. that'd be rockin.

Thursday, January 11, 2001 12:30 a.m. PST
hm. it appears that my link did not survive jack saturn's site redesign. guess my lil' page wasn't cool enough for him. ahwell, if i were to ax his link over on the right, it prolly wouldn't make a diff in terms of referrals, so i may as well leavitt. a bit disappointing: but i'm a musician, i need to get used to it.

Wednesday, January 10, 2001 09:29 p.m. PST
me, robert, and three other guys from the house went into sf last night to see crouching tiger, hidden dragon, which i hadn't heard of until robert told me about it the preceding day. originally we were gonna see the 8pm show, but 101's weekday evening traffic and a wrong turn made the trip take twice as long as it usually would. consequently, the 8 show was sold out by the time we got to the metreon, but we all wanted to see the film on the world's largest movie screen, so we decided to wait three hours until the next IMAX showing at 11.

in the meantime we went to the virgin megastore. it really amazes me that a music store can be so large and so useless at the same time. i picked up some modest mouse and the pixies' trompe le monde, after not finding about five other records i was looking for. the whole experience made me really grumbly. it took me awhile to round up my party, but when i finally did, we made a beeline for the nearest carl's jr., where this homeless guy was making up vulgar lyrics to the top40 tunes streaming out of the speakers. tony said i'd make a great whore, cuz i eat so fast. yucky.

the movie was excellent, except i felt that all the "flying" was kinda gratuitous. the fight scenes far surpassed those in the matrix, mostly because the people involved in them were well-trained martial artists. and women performed the lion's share of the sparring, which is pretty damn progressive by any standard, and especially for the far east. wasn't too drawn in by the love story, but the nonlinear plot was quite appealing. highly recommended, and anyone in the bay area should trek out to see it at the metreon. it took about 30 minutes for my eyes to adjust to the extreme width and height of the screen, but the experience was so worth the 10 bucks admission.

on the way there i played doolittle and bossanova for my passengers (we took my car). when "all over the world" came on, tony innocently asked, "is this korn?" you can imagine my reaction. it just goes to show, the pixies' influence on 90s rock can't be overstated. like the point needed proving.

Tuesday, January 9, 2001 08:21 a.m. PST
the new burning airlines record is scheduled for a may 7 release and will be followed by the usual frantic spate of US and european touring. i'm biting my nails already, because their first record was pretty goddamn phenomenal. plus that d-plan/juno split cdep you've no doubt heard about will be available for tangible consumption in early march, in accordance with the announcement on the plan's website. that holiday single came and went so fast i couldn't get hold of it. damn. their fourth lp is tentatively scheduled for a fall release, so go ahead and start holding your breath now. all this courtesy of -- yeah -- desoto's page.

also, the 90 day men have a new 7" coming out, or that's already out, or something. i heard about it somewhere reputable, so go pickitupalready. the band has a new website that's not quite ready for primetime, but bookmark it now cuz it looks like it'll have some quality content in the near future.

in case you hadn't heard yet, delusions of adequacy gave one of my songs a less than stellar review. i'll post more extensive comments on the matter later today.